


The Dead Room

by arctowardsthesun



Category: Ripper Street
Genre: F/M, M/M, Oral Sex
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-08-28
Updated: 2017-02-02
Packaged: 2017-12-24 22:11:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/945257
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/arctowardsthesun/pseuds/arctowardsthesun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A dead-room is a strange place to realize that you're in lust with someone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Night After

A dead room is a strange place to realize that you’re in lust with someone. It hadn’t occurred to either of them that there was more to their strange partnership until Reid had slammed Jackson up against the wall in the laboratory in his fit of righteous rage and their bodies had been closer than two had any right to be.

Jackson knew all about slamming people up against walls and what tended to follow but it had been a long time since he’d been on the receiving end of it. That wasn’t to say that it hadn’t been long deserved. The fact that the orphanage debacle had not provoked such a response was a testament to Reid’s disposition. Jackson found his thoughts were wandering over this, he steered them back to the task at hand.

Rose’s cunt was warm and wet, thanks to his attentions, and she deserved better than a half-hearted attempt at making her come, tart or no. He’d never gotten around to finishing what he started the night they’d found the body of Maude Thwaits. And then there had been one thing after another, since Reid had built him that ridiculous dead room. The man had given him Johns Hopkins! In Whitechapel! From memory! Damn the man.

He felt Rose shudder on his tongue and her moans interrupted his reverie. He pulled his head out from under her skirt as he collected his thoughts. He had to admit that his mind had never drifted in such a fashion while performing cunnilinguis but then again, he’d never been slammed up against a wall in such a fashion before.

“Penny for your thoughts.”

“Sorry, sweetheart, long day at the office.”

She laughed her throaty laugh and pulled him to her. “I’ll fix that!” she giggled, as she fell backwards onto the bed, pulling him with her. “Get out of those trousers and cure what ails you, doctor.”

As his cock pumped in and out of her cunt, he tried to keep his thoughts on the here and now, not the saddest-eyed man in England and his hideous plaid suits.

***  
Emily was asleep in her room when Reid got in that night. Or at least he presumed she was asleep, the door was shut and there was no light seeping through the cracks. He’d sent word that’d he be late, trusty, baby-faced Hobbs had delivered the message no doubt, and she was long past waiting up for him.

He lay, staring up at the ceiling, sleep remaining elusive despite what seemed like years since his last chance to rest. He couldn’t shake the memory of pushing Jackson up against that wall in the dead room he’d built for him. Jackson had deserved it just as much as he’d deserved the punch to the jaw, there was no two ways around it, but why couldn’t he move on and sleep the sleep of the just?

Straightening Jackson’s waistcoat might have been… gratuitous, perhaps? But when you have a man hauled up against a wall by said waistcoat and holding him so leeches the rage from your bones, what else, exactly, is one to do? Carry on as if nothing had happened, that was the only logical procedure from there, of course. So straightening the waistcoat it was.

Reid shifted uneasily in his bed, his body felt strange and as he rolled over, he realized why. His prick was hard. Harder than it had been since… since his last Sunday with Emily, long before -- No, he would not think of that. But, why this sudden change in physiognomy? No, it was not the thought of Jackson, pinned up against the wall with his own hands and the heat of his body pressed up against his. It couldn’t be.

As he continued to stare into the darkness, trying desperately to sleep, his prick remained stubbornly at attention. Reid sighed, and reached over into his nightstand for a handkerchief. Stroking his prick, he thought dutifully of Emily and the little gasps of pleasure she made when he brushed his thumb over her nipples and how she moaned when he entered her cunt.

As his prick pumped in and out of his fist, he tried to keep his thoughts on Emily, not that rake of a Yankee and his ridiculous accent.


	2. Amphetamine

Jackson felt the fool. Here he was, sitting in his damnable dead room, staring at the bottle of clear fluid that Drake had shoved in his hand. He supposed he should thank the man, after all, it had interrupted his train of thought. There are only so many places a mind can go, sitting outside a whiskey bar with a bottle of beer in one’s hand, especially after a night like the last. And his mind kept wandering back to Reid and his sad eyes, finally showing something other than his habitual disappointment in the world at large and Jackson in particular.

“Hang it.” He downed the contents of the vial and, why not, the contents of the tube he had filled from it. It wasn’t long before he was feeling the effects. Amphetamine! He had to find Reid and tell him! Or slam him up against a wall, he wasn’t quite sure.

***  
Reid stared down at Jackson, limp on the chaise lounge. He’d been a damn fool, downing that concoction that Dr Crabb had been giving Lucy and had acted like it while under its effects. That must explain the strange looks he’d been giving Reid, it certainly explained the revolver, but left no reason for the way his pulse started to race when he caught Jackson’s eye.

And now here they were, Reid watching as Jackson came down off of that strange new intoxicant and feeling the strangest urge to brush a stray lock of hair off of his forehead. They’d saved the girl, Drake and him, from a fate worse than death but somehow that seemed unimportant at the moment.

Jackson opened his eyes and grinned that rakish grin at him. “Reid, I would almost think you cared about me, the way you’re looming,” he said with a laugh.

“Well, it’s just… We don’t know much about that amphetamine and you took the whole vial… And…” Reid was at a loss for words, he hadn’t been this incoherent since he proposed to Emily and, well, he felt the same strange feeling in his stomach as he did the first time he’d danced with her.

“I’ll be right as rain, soon enough. You can go home to your wife, I’m sure she misses you.”

“My wife is none of your concern, captain.”

“And I am none of yours.” Reid didn’t know what to say to that, so he nodded a curt farewell and turned towards the door.

“If you’re so worried about my well-being, Reid, you can send Rose on up. I’m sure she’ll doctor me up good.”

He paused mid-step, a twinge of what, jealousy, it couldn’t be, twisting in his gut. “I’m sure she will,” he replied, hoping that Jackson hadn’t noticed the stutter in his exit. He sighed as he closed the door and descended the stairs.  
That night, alone is his cold bed, Reid’s thoughts kept drifting from their appropriate place of between Emily’s thighs and onto a half-unbuttoned shirt and the chest beneath it and a brown chaise lounge.

***  
There was something wrong, Jackson realized, he was awake and, while the sun was making its way through the blinds, it wasn’t high enough to explain why he was conscious. The amphetamine had left him limp and wrung out and a tumble in the sheets with Rose had not had the desired effect. Oh, his cock had felt a sight better but despite all evidence to the contrary, it did not rule him. He fumbled on his nightstand, he had some laudanum somewhere and he wanted dreamless sleep after what had awoken him.

A damp spot in his bed. Such as he hadn’t had since his voice broke. Oh he’d the occasional rude dream since then, on the rare occasion when he could look but not touch. And the content of this dream fell definitively into an occasion where he couldn’t touch.

They were back in the dead room. He was pinned up against the wall, again eye to eye with Reid, mouths at a height. Reid let go of him, straightened his waistcoat and started smoothing it down, as if to hide their altercation but unlike in reality, his hands wandered further down until they were just dusting Jackson’s cock. The faintest ghost of a smile crossed Reid’s face as he pressed his palm harder against him. Jackson froze as he felt his cock harden in autonomic response. The smile on Reid’s face grew a fraction wider as he felt the change in Jackson’s body.

“Don’t move, captain.”

“Ah…” he attempted to reply in the affirmative? The negative? Jackson wasn’t quite sure but either way the words were lodged in his throat.

Reid’s smile reached his eyes as he pressed harder, his fingers curling around the length of Jackson’s cock. Ever so slowly, he started moving his hand up and down. A strangled moan escaped Jackson’s lips as he pressed his hips into Reid’s hand. He’d never hated trousers more than in that moment.

“I said, don’t move.”

“Er…”

“Do you want me to stop?” Reid paused his stroking.

“Er…”

“I’ll take that as a no.” He resumed his attentions, each movement slightly faster than the one before.

Jackson bit his lower lip in an attempt stifle the stream of consciousness that always poured from his mouth in situations like this. Not that he’d been in a situation _particularly_ like this ever. Reid began to actually grin at this, an unfamiliar expression to Jackson but one that suited him. His ministrations were pushing Jackson closer and closer to climax and just as he spurted his seed, he awoke.

Alone.


	3. Troubled Sleep

Reid’s sleep was troubled despite wearing himself out with thoughts of better days with Emily. He kept stirring from dreams that he could hardly remember, even immediately after waking. Jackson was there, though, of that he was certain, his gravelly, American voice distinctive even though the lens of a dream. What was it about the man? He couldn’t shake him from his thoughts, waking or sleeping.

No matter, Reid told himself, Jackson would be shoved, deliberately and with great care, into the nice, neat box in his mind to which he belonged. His surgeon, his scientist. The man he beggared the division to buy the best dead-room in all of London, a niggling voice reminded.

He lay abed a while, as the sun rose over London, attempting to compact the tangled morass of Captain Homer Jackson into a cupboard labeled “surgeon.” The more he struggled with the problem, Reid found, the smaller the cupboard seemed and the larger Jackson became. He had no more succeeded in turning the lock on the mental cupboard than he noticed his prick was hard. Had it been so when he had awoken the final time? He thought so and while it was not unusual for him to awaken in such a condition, its persistence was odd.

Jackson needed no further distraction on Reid’s part to burst the lock on the cupboard door and the final piece of his mental puzzle clicked into place. He was agog a moment, staring at the ceiling. It fit. Nicely, neatly, like no other things in his life did. He wanted Jackson. Wanted another man, in the way he had wanted Emily when they were first married.

The clock in the front hall struck six and Reid started. He could not lie in bed all day and contemplate what exactly he wanted to do to that scruffy Yank but he could stay a few moments longer and indulge in fantasy.

They were both naked, standing face to face in Jackson’s filthy rooms in the cat house on Tenter Street. Reid closed the short distance between them and kissed him roughly, twining his fingers in Jackson’s hair. Tugging on it as he kissed harder. A beat later and Jackson started kissing him back, enthusiastically.

Jackson reached up and caressed his chest, the running of his thumbs over Reid’s nipples causing him to gasp and come up for air. He grinned at Reid and moved one hand lower, tracing the line of dark hair that lead to his prick.

“Hot damn, Reid, your cock is as hard as a rock. Do I need to do something about it?”

Reid swallowed, his mouth suddenly feeling very dry, and licked his lips. “Ah, well…”

Jackson’s grin grew wider. “I promise it won’t hurt. Trust me, I’m a doctor.” He steered Reid over to the chaise lounge and pushed him down onto it. Climbing on top of him, Jackson began stroking Reid’s prick, his own pressing into Reid’s thigh. He let out a moan as Jackson suddenly sucked his nipple into his mouth.

“A vocal man, I like it. But we can’t have you disturbing the neighbors.” Reid’s eyes widened at that statement, considering the neighbors, but did not move as Jackson shifted and sealed his mouth with a hungry kiss. He slipped his tongue into Reid’s mouth to further stifle the moans that the actions of his hand were creating. Reid reached up to touch Jackson, run his hands over any piece of skin he could. He was close, so close, to climax.

The clock in the front hall struck quarter after and Reid’s reverie came abruptly to an end. He could not stay in bed all day and luxuriate in dreams. He hurriedly shoved Captain Homer Jackson and his desires back into the ever shrinking cupboard and locked the door. Twice. The floor was cold on his bare feet and was a welcome distraction from the vagrancies of his other organs. The colder water on his dressing stand, when splashed on his face, helped cool his ardour, and when splashed on his prick completely doused its flames.


	4. Whisky and Cigarettes

That day was torture, on both parts. Jackson staggered into Reid’s office sometime well after noon and slumped in a chair.

“You look unwell, Captain.”

“You try mixing laudanum with the remains of an amphetamine high and see how well you look the next morning.”

“Rose’s prescription?”

“No, my own. Got any more of that hangover cure of yours lying around?”

"Certainly, but do you feel that's wise?"

"Stop being an old woman Reid, I did worse in medical school. Besides, Atherton said you needed me for something."

"You came of your own volition? I sent Drake to collect you."

Jackson looked at Reid and opened his mouth as if to say something then closed it without a word. Reid felt a strange heat rise in his cheeks, Jackson came to see him? Without prompting? He told himself firmly not to read anything into it, the man just wanted his secret formula, which his psyche promptly ignored.

“They found a body in an alley off of Brady Street, I wanted you to take a look.”

“Of, of course, I’d be happy to.”

Reid hadn’t made it to Inspector for nothing and couldn’t help noticing a strange flush in Jackson’s tanned face. “Are you altogether well, Jackson? You look a bit off.”

“Must be the strange concoction I’ve got running through my veins, that hangover cure of yours that I came to get-” Jackson coughed, as if to cover something up, “That should fix me right up.”

Reid looked at him askance and felt a heat rising in his own cheeks. He coughed too. “The body is in the dead-room, I’ll fix you up a dose of my cure while we’re there, I need you in top form today.” An alternate meaning of what he just said flashed through his mind and his cheeks felt even hotter.

“You don’t look so well yourself, Reid. Whatever it is I’ve got, I hope it isn’t catching,” Jackson said with a teasing grin and then, as if something clicked, looked a bit shocked.

Reid coughed again. “The dead-room, er, ah, the body is in it, I need you to--”  
“Ah, yes, the body, can’t let that wait around. Lead the way, Reid.”

Reid heard Jackson get out of the chair as he walked out of the door; what he missed was a tentative hand, raised to touch him on the shoulder, that hesitated just a second too long.

***  
“Get out of my goddamned dead-room, Reid!” Jackson growled. “And stop lurking over my shoulder, a man can’t think with you hovering like a goddamned nursemaid!”

Reid tried to come up with a compelling argument for him staying but he knew, however much he hated it, that the only reason he was lurking in the dead-room was to keep feeling the electric buzz he was getting from standing next to Jackson and the faint hope that there would be another occasion to slam him up against the wall. Not that he had any real idea of what he would do if the opportunity presented itself but that did not diminish the desire.

“I’ll be in my office if you need me, Captain,” Reid said with exaggerated stiffness as he let himself out of the room.

Jackson let out a deep sigh as the door shut behind Reid. Why on earth had he shooed him out of the room? It _was_ hard to work with him around. Focusing on the task at hand was incredibly difficult when all he could think about was how to position himself to “accidently” bump into Reid and feel the frisson of excitement run up his spine. Damn the man. And it wasn’t as if Reid seemed to mind being bumped into, quite the contrary, he always seemed to be in the way.

And that exchange in Reid’s office. What had that been all about? They’d both been blushing like schoolgirls. He’d thought there, for a moment, that maybe Reid had felt something like he had that night, when his face flushed at something that had had the slightest hint of a double entendre. The man was married, for chrissakes, but then again so was he and marriage hadn’t stopped that man back in Chicago from leaving a lasting impression on Jackson.

Jackson looked down at his hands; the man back in Chicago had had the loveliest, cleverest hands and he’d learned a trick or two from him. But there was something- Oh. His hands were covered in blood and there was a scalpel in one. Now was not the time to be reminiscing, back to the poor soul found in the alley off Brady Street.

***  
Reid sat in his office, fingers steepled, deep in thought. Drake looked in on him a few times but decided against intruding on his meditation, since nothing was of great import and the expression on Reid’s face deterred interruption. It was unfortunate, since Reid was simply mulling over Jackson and what to do about him, and would have greatly welcomed a distraction. He was studiously avoiding thinking of Jackson naked or what he would do with a naked Jackson; however, that still left him with how to arrange a situation in which they would both be naked and how Jackson would react to such a situation. It was a rather excruciating combination. The only thing that broke his concentration was the arrival of Jackson himself.

“Reid, I’ve got your results.”

Reid jumped. “Excuse me, I didn’t hear you come in.”

Jackson cocked an eyebrow, Reid wasn’t normally the type to be so lost in thought. He let the moment pass and then filled Reid in on his findings, nothing terribly exciting to be honest. It was straightforward and one of the drunk and/or incompetent surgeons that had filled Jackson’s role before Reid deputized him could have done it without too much difficulty.

Reid summoned Drake and sent him to resolve the case. Normally he would have gone along but, today was… special. As soon as Drake left, a strained silence filled Reid’s office. There were some awkward coughs and uneasy shifting.

Jackson spoke first. “That night… in the dead-room, I--”

“I probably shouldn’t have straightened your waistcoat, I apologize.”

“No, no… I was just--” Jackson steeled himself. “Just wondering if you’d like to continue the conversation in Tenter Street.”

Was he imagining it or was Jackson leering at him? Reid couldn’t be sure if Jackson was actually propositioning him or just being his normal, lewd self.

“I thought we had resolved that issue already, Jackson. But if you feel there is more to discuss, I do believe that Sergeant Drake has everything well in hand and I can leave him to it.” Reid was shocked by the words coming out of his mouth. Was he actually trying to maneuver them into a situation like he’d been imagining all afternoon? What was he doing?

The trip to Tenter Street passed in a blur, so much so that they both started when Jackson closed the door to his rooms.

“Whisky?” Jackson gestured to the bottle and glasses on the table. “Help yourself,” he added, with his customary lack of anything resembling ceremony.

He lit a cigarette and Reid couldn’t help but stare at Jackson’s hands. Had he ever really noticed his hands before? They were surgeon’s hands and Reid was distracted by thoughts of what they might be able to do. The hands offered him an open cigarette case and Reid’s thoughts were cut short. He took one, just for him to have something to do with his own hands.

They sat, smoking cigarettes and drinking whisky, not speaking, until the bottle was gone and Jackson stood up abruptly. Reid looked up from his glass where he had been swirling the last sip for the past few moments and watched him walk over, until Jackson was standing right in front of him. Reid craned his neck to look up at him.

“I’m probably going to regret this,” he said with a slight slur from the whiskey as he leaned down and kissed Reid, hard, on the mouth.


	5. Minette

Jackson broke the kiss. Reid stood up and Jackson took a step back, unsure of the reaction. Reid followed his step and murmured something under his breath that Jackson, close as they were, couldn’t make out, and then he kissed Jackson, as hungrily as he himself had been kissed.

It was if the dam holding their passions in check had burst. Jackson, without breaking the kiss, began fumbling with the button’s of Reid’s waistcoat as he had discarded his jacket and cravat about a quarter of the way through the whisky. Reid felt this was a brilliant idea and began himself attempting to get Jackson’s off of him.

Taking a breath, Jackson muttered, “Damn these buttons all to hell.”

Panting, Reid abandoned Jackson’s waistcoat and took over unbuttoning his own. “Let me. I’ve got practice,” he said and blushed when he realized what he implied. Jackson laughed and resumed kissing him the second he could push Reid’s waistcoat off of his shoulders and onto the floor. Jackson’s was similarly discarded by Reid. Suspenders followed waistcoats and Reid suddenly found Jackson attempting to divest him of his trousers.

"I... I'm..." Reid’s blood was somewhere other than his brain and he found the words difficult.

"Not sure if this is something you want to do?"

"No, but..."

"Then shut up and kiss me while I get your trousers off."

The small part of Reid's brain that was telling him that this was a bad idea was getting smaller and quieter and he complied. They both kicked off their shoes once Reid's pants were unfastened. Jackson took the chance to breathe while fumbling with his own trousers.

"Damnable buttons. If they didn’t keep my cock in my pants, I’d get rid of them."

Reid started laughing, “I didn’t realize that there was anything that was successful at that!”

Jackson attempted to glare but a wry grin got in the way, which just caused Reid to laugh more. His glare turned to the buttons on his trousers, and it must have helped, because they came undone. Finally. He dropped and stepped out of them, leaving him in only his loose shirt.

Reid stepped in closer to Jackson and ran his fingers through the hair at the back of Jackson’s head, which he then grabbed and tugged. Jackson went slightly weak at the knees and grabbed at Reid’s prick in revenge.

“C... Can... we continue this conversation on your bed?” Reid breathed and released his grip on Jackson’s hair, he was having difficulty staying vertical.

“Of course,” Jackson replied. Pulling the taller man’s mouth down to his and kissing it, he continued caressing Reid’s prick.

“You’re not helping…”

Jackson just smirked at him. Relenting, he moved his hand and gently steered Reid around the detritus littering the floor and to his bed. Jackson pulled Reid’s trousers and drawers down to his ankles and pushed him onto the bed. Reid kicked off the offending garments, twisting to be orientated properly on the bed, he grabbed Jackson and pulled him down to him.

They resumed kissing, desperately, as if they were drowning and the other was air. Jackson slipped his tongue into Reid’s mouth, eliciting a moan; he reached down to resume his attentions. After a few moments of stoking Reid’s flames with his hand, he shimmied down the bed until his head was level with Reid’s prick.

“What are you doing?” Reid asked, lifting his head and looking down at Jackson.

He smirked back. “You’ll see.” And with that, he slowly ran his tongue all the way up Reid’s prick, base to tip.

Reid exhaled sharply and fell back against the bed, he had not been expecting _that_. No one had ever done something like that before, not that there had been many “ones” before this. His introspection was cut short by more sensations that he’d never felt before. Jackson was doing something to his prick, something that felt _phenomenal_ and was preventing him from shifting his unfocused gaze from the ceiling; something with his mouth, that much Reid could tell.

He let out a soft, breathy moan and Jackson paused, his mouth moving into what Reid could only assume to be a grin. He resumed his efforts. Reid felt his hips moving ever so slightly up and down in time with Jackson’s motions, his hands drifting down to rest gently on the top of Jackson’s head, he wasn’t quite sure where else to put them.

“I’m... I’m about to…” Reid managed to collect his thoughts enough to put together half a sentence. It didn’t help that he had no real idea of what he was trying to say, either. “You might want to… I don’t know what…”

“Leave that to me,” Jackson said, switching to a hand, the other reaching for one of his discarded neckerchiefs on the floor. He placed the cloth over Reid’s prick and resumed his long, even strokes. He crawled back up the bed, far enough that he could kiss Reid intensely again, which was enough to push him over the edge.

**Author's Note:**

> Set between episodes 4 and 5.


End file.
